Monday, December 31, 2012

Rowan Williams - a tribute

Being New Year's Eve, His Grace usually thanks God for the past year and prophesies the most significant events of the next. But (being manifestly fallible) His Grace makes a poor seer, so has decided no longer to indulge in necromancy. But here is what is known:

On 10th January 2013, the College of Canons will meet in the Chapter House of the Cathedral to elect Bishop Justin as the new Archbishop, having received a Congé d’Elire from the Crown.

On 4th February 2013, a ceremony will be held in St Paul’s Cathedral where the Dean of Canterbury will confirm to an episcopal commission that Bishop Justin has been elected according to statute; and the present Bishop of Durham will then legally become the 105th Archbishop of Canterbury.

On 21st March 2013, Bishop Justin’s Enthronement in Canterbury Cathedral will follow, when he will be placed in the diocesan throne in the Cathedral Quire, and in the Chair of St Augustine, by the Dean.

Until that date, it has been decided that His Grace will return to take charge of the Church of England, so he's got 80 days to sort out a few messes. He wishes to begin his second stint at Lambeth Palace by paying tribute to his immediate predecessor.

Opinions on ++Rowan fall into two main camps: on the one hand, there are those who remember him for perpetual near-schism over gay priests; further near-schism over women bishops; paralysis and inaction over the Pope's 'imaginative pastoral response' of the Ordinariate; and the folly of the announcement about the inevitability of sharia law in the UK.

On the other hand, there are those who pay tribute to the towering intellect of the theologian, philosopher, poet and dear friend.

His Grace is not going to add substantially to either. As with all biography and hagiography, the truth lies somewhere between the two, and this blog has attempted to bridge the gulf a number of times (see here, here, here and here (and not forgetting here]).

The reality is that people have been prophesying the demise of the Church of England since it was established: it was once referred to as being ‘crucified between two thieves’ - the respective fanaticism and superstition of ‘the Puritans and the Papists’. There is a modern parallel with a church now suspended between the decline in institutional religion and the burgeoning of generalised ‘spirituality’; between the secularisation of society and the plurality of faith communities. The postmodern context is marked by diversity, fragmentation and all that is transitory; beliefs and practices are culturally relative, and Anglicanism has ceased to be supra-cultural or catholic.

In a farewell documentary 'Goodbye to Canterbury' to be broadcast on New Year's Day, Dr Williams compares the iconoclasm of the Reformation to the destruction of our contemporary false gods: "When today's idols, false or otherwise, are built up and smashed down, I'm glad to have this place to retreat to, and remember that these are arguments that never go away. It's a mistake we make too easily to think we've progressed between the moral questions of the past, but what we can put behind us is institutions that have failed."

He reflects: "Institutions develop because people put a lot of trust in them, they meet real needs, they represent important aspirations, whether it's monasteries, media, or banks, people begin by trusting these institutions, and gradually the suspicion develops that actually they're working for themselves, not for the community. At the end of the middle ages, nobody would ever have expected the monasteries to vanish from the scene within a generation – yet they did, change does happen."

Rowan Williams has perpetuated the via media for a further decade, against all the odds and contra all the prophets of doom. Whether or not you agreed with him, you must concede that this is evidence of his considerable ability to sustain dialogue and relationship and keep people in communion with one another. It might be imperfect, but if the Lord's command for us to love one another means anything, it must be that we remain friendly (indeed, loving) when we do not agree.

The Church of England has always struggled with the tension between affirmation of the gospel and assimilation to the prevailing culture; between transformation and inculturation. Establishment commits the Church to full involvement in civil society and to making a contribution to the public discussion of issues that have moral or spiritual implications. If Rowan Williams has shown us anything, it is that these cannot easily be reduced to soundbites, neat headlines or trite blogposts: profound matters demand profound contemplation and an articulation which does them justice. More often than not, Dr Williams has been purposely woefully misunderstood and misreported by a ferociously judgmental and increasingly hostile anti-Anglican press. His successor will fare no better: it is the zeitgeist.

We are no longer in an age, if ever we were, where the Archbishop of Canterbury can impose a morality or a doctrine of God. Archbishop Rowan saw his primary function as being the acutely political one of calling the state to account by obstinately asking the Government about its accountability and the justification of its priorities. He may sometimes have been a thorn in the Prime Minister's side; he might even have been a 'disaster' on the political front and occasionally infuriating. But being the very incarnation of the command to love, he was always sensitive, vulnerable and respectful. He has been and remains a true Prince of the Church.

171 Comments:

So, YG, in the 13 years of blatent socialist destruction of our national culture, identity, prosperity and humanity, what did Mr Williams do that made a positive contribution to oppose all the godless? I can't name one thing.

It is sad that such a towering intellectual should have been so caught up in the women's movement that the prize of church unity has been relegated to second place. What a waste of talent on an ungrateful movement that sees everything only on their terms.

We're all human, and none of us perfect. But as Your Grace points out, ++Rowan has been so calm, patient and loving through turbulent times for both Church and State. I wish him well at Cambridge and beyond.

Of course the insuperable difficulty for the C. of E. is that she is quite incapable of distinguishing between change and development.A body capable of development must first possess a nature that is intrinsically open to it, and to know what constitutes development for such a body one must understand this nature and what may properly express and fulfill it. Unfortunately for the C. of E. it is a pseudomorphic entity; a body established by, and to serve, a political arrangement masquerading as a religious one; a pseudo-Church that by nature is obliged to assimilate to the surrounding culture rather than a true Church that seeks to assimilate the surrounding culture to itself.The bloody dissolution and looting of the monasteries in England no doubt heralded great political change, but they hardly marked any spiritual development in the life of the nation. Ditto the iconoclasm and mindless destruction of the Reformation.

Thank you, Your Grace -- especially for providing continuity during the hiatus :). May I support your tribute to Archbishop Williams.

For many other nowadays, Marxist/euro re-inscription clearly colours understanding of the British Christianity which informs every strand of our cultural tapestry. Those who look beyond the propaganda, however, will see how literary and linguistic elements have contributed to a fabric that manifests the essence of the threads themselves. Our preservation of literacy, later enhanced by printing, made visible (in English) what is otherwise invisible. Evidence of the flowering of our culture, and of Your Grace's own contribution, thus stands. The heritage is unsurpassed!

So I'm only too grateful for the presently maligned Reformation, which for so long enabled our freedom from the chains wrought by unholy Romans (who crucified Christ). Those foreign princes were ever political, economic, and authoritarian in nature: and while they work to tighten their purchase, I will resist them beyond my dying breath. As ever, more power to the Greeks: who showed us the way to the Demos!

A gracious review of the outgoing Archbishop, Cranmer. It can't be easy leading any church, and just as the standards for Christian leaders are high, so too are the burdens.

Rowan's character has undoubtedly been that of all professional Christian intellectuals: reliance on his own mental talents. This has meant his incumbency has been reflective, thoughtful, and complex, but also detached, unnecessarily ambiguous, and at times paralysed by not only the indecision characteristic of fence-sitting academics everywhere, but the indecision of a man for whom definitive statements on morality (excepting, of course, the morality of bankers) are distasteful.

The CofE rolls on, though to what end, nobody is quite sure. Thank God we rely on Him, because if we relied solely on our human power, we'd be rapidly approaching oblivion.

One wonders, Your Grace, if Rowan has ever understood the full extent of the influence of the CofE. The recent royal wedding, watched by a reported 2 billion viewers, was a case in point. There has never been an event in the history of mankind in which the Christian message has been experience simultaneously by so many people. It was of course an occasion that was appropriately trivialised by the forces of secularism in the form of the BBC.

But on that day ++ Rowan did the CofE proud. The schismatic issues were temporarily forgotten and the Anglican communion was very relevant in 2 billion lives. No small achievement.

'The Church of England has always struggled with the tension between affirmation of the gospel and assimilation to the prevailing culture'. Indeed.

A religion which is linked to the State can only work properly when the two are of one accord.When the State attempts to manipulate Religion to comply with the prevailing 'moral code'of the Government this brings the Church into direct conflict with who will take first priority God or man?.Of course there should be no question about who the Church should serve but 'Rendering unto Caesar'may not be so easy when Caesar demands that you sacrifice your morals as well as your money.

The gulf between Church and State is widening and the two are set on very different courses.

Is a' State Church' still viable?

'You adulterous people, don't you know that friendship with the world is hatred toward God? Anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God.'(James 4:4)

Perhaps we do not need an 'intellectual'leading the church but someone who is prepared to preach the Word of God for as Paul said,(1 Corinthians 2)

And so it was with me, brothers and sisters. When I came to you, I did not come with eloquence or human wisdom as I proclaimed to you the testimony about God. For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. I came to you in weakness with great fear and trembling. My message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit’s power, so that your faith might not rest on human wisdom, but on God’s power.

Archbishop Rowan Williams is a prince of a man and a good man too. But he is not a "Prince of the Church".

He never got the red hat from the Pope that would designate him as a cardinal for obvious historical reasons. The last RC Cardinal and Archbishop of Canterbury died in 1558.

The term Prince of the Church is used nearly exclusively for Roman Catholic cardinals and bishops designated cardinals by the pope from the Eastern Churches and Byzantine Churches in union with Rome. Cardinals are always treated in protocol as equivalents of royal princes.

The last Roman Catholic Prince of the Church who was an Archbishop of Canterbury was Cardinal Reginald Pole who died in 1558. He was the 67th Roman Catholic Archbishop of Canterbury to be in direct line from the first Roman Catholic Archbishop of Canterbury sent from Rome by Pope Gregory the Great to England in the 596 AD.

God be with the present Anglican Archbishop of Canterbury and his successor the Anglican Justin Welby in his difficult path to lead his Church in the increasingly anti religion era of the 21st century.

You're not wrong there Rebel. I once went to hear Canterbury and York speaking together in Cambridge. York mentions Jesus every five seconds. Canterbury - hardly at all. It's like he's a bit embarrassed by it all. Understandable I suppose. Jesus did talk such a load of crap . . .

Inspector - until relatively recently, little was know of how Jesus truly presented Himself during the course of His ministry. But that was before some amazingly rare video footage was unearthed at Nag Hammadi. Take a look!

Add to your faith virtue; and to virtue knowledge; and to knowledge temperance; and to temperance patience; and to patience godliness; and to godliness brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness charity.

For if these things be in you, and abound, they make you that ye shall neither be barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Wherefore the rather, brethren, give diligence to make your calling and election sure: for if ye do these things, ye shall never fall. For so an entrance shall be ministered unto you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. According as his divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue.

Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and precious promises: that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.

At the risk of being accused of 'causing controversy' or 'instigating a heresy'...I wonder if the real function of' the Church has' been lost?.

The word' Church' does not appear in the Bible and I believe there is a good reason for this.The original word(which' church' replaced )was Ekklesia(a gathering of people, an assembly of people.The two have been merged into one.King James forbade the translators of the Bible to use the word Ekklesia and enforced the word' Church.King James made fifteen specific edicts, as far as the translation goes, and one of those edicts (edict number three) stated that this bible was to retain the word "church" in the translation and it was not to be replaced with the word "congregation." That was his specific edict. He has no jurisdiction over the congregation (people), but he does over the church (physical buildings). So you can see he never wanted the word "assembly" associated with the original meaning of the Old Testament which meant "congregation." So he knew the correct translation, obviously, but he didn't want it in there, that way they retain control over "the church.".A King(or Government) can control a Church but not an Ekklesia.The word' Church' belongs to an Institution with buildings.All Churches, including the State incorporated Church, unincorporated Church, unregistered Church, etc., are under the jurisdiction of man. These Churches define themselves in particular ways that you do not find in scripture. In other words, Christ did not define his ekklesia to be those things. These designations were created by the natural man, because Christ never defines His ekklesia to be incorporated or unincorporated. The laws of man have jurisdiction over the Church because they are man-made terms, and man has jurisdiction over man-made things. Whoever creates something is the same who controls something, and he retains the authority and the power to alter or destroy at will. So, if man creates an organization, no matter what he calls it, then man controls it. If God creates an organization, then He is the one who should control it.

If you believe that, it is easy to understand that men will do earthly things such as create an organisational structure to manage worship. As we know, the organisational structure of the Church creates material structures by way of shelter for the worshippers. And we're not inhibited about property ownership and modest materialism. Or are you?

You seem inordinately afraid of the acts of man in the worship of God. King James appears to have been sufficiently intelligent to realise that as a temporal sovereign he had an interest in the propagation of Christ's message to man. King James's chosen vehicle was the KJ bible that you revere.

Would you prefer that the KJV did not exist?

How would you post on His Grace's blog if the KJV had not been ordered (edicted?) by KJ as head of the established Church?

It's a nice idea Len, but "church" didn't solely mean the buildings, it was recognisable as the collective and corporate "institution". "Congregation" carried two main theological associations that probably account for James' edict: firstly as a constituency of the organization of the Catholic Church (and thus unacceptable to James), and secondly as the preferred term in what we would probably now think of as non-conformists: anabaptists and the like (who were equally unacceptable). The latter group is really the important one: ideas about a non-governed invisible church are really what are being rebuffed by the insistence on "church". It's one of the reasons that James commissioned the Authorized Version in the first place, instead of just adopting the Geneva Bible, which tended to go down precisely the route you advocate.

Worth noting that Jesus probably didn't use the term Ekklesia - unless he taught in Greek. His preferred metaphors seem to be house and kingdom.

However, I get your point, and agree: we could do with assessing just what the Body of Christ entails in the modern age. I certainly agree that God should be at the head of the Church, and as the sovereign in our lives - and that's a hierarchy which we overturn at our peril. But I don't think man-made things need be seen as mutually exclusive with that hierarchy: it's a question of putting our talents and gifts to His service so that our man-made things and actions reflect His glory. The rot sets in when we put the things we make, or the things we do, above God. I doubt there's a congregation in the world where that hasn't happened at some point.

Really like your interesting point about Ekklesia and congregation; certainly messianic jews in the Land call their body of Christ congregation. Thank you for the information about the King James edits as well. I understand that he had the name Yacob/Jacob changed to James in the gospels and letters to glorify himself and his Kingship but I could be wrong.

On ++Williams I lost respect for him when he agreed to Anthony Kenny in the Oxford debate with Dawkins that man "evolved" from non humans. What a tragedy. Here is the full debate.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bow4nnh1Wv0

I had a similar Road to Damascus moment with David Cameron when he said he supported homosexual so called marriage "because he was a Conservative". I do pray for ++Welby elect and thank God that he has ++Sentamu behind him as his No2.

Point well made Len. The Problems arise when leaders are appointed by men who have no spiritual discernment & the members of the 'Church' have no say in the matter. Their only options are to obey or seek fellowship elsewhere.From the very start the true Church has often been at odds with the ruling elite & suffered persecution & martyrdom as a result. A quick glance at this Blog for 27/12/12 proves that nothing has changed, in this instant a politico/religious body trying to suppress the truth, just as the Roman emperors did all those centuries ago.Unfortunately in modern times the Church has the form of religion but not the power. preferring to preach either a philosophical universalism or strange manifestations, never known in the early Church as the work of the Holy Spirit but rather sorcerery.Or a conscience appeasing humanist, social 'gospel' that is inclusive of equality at all costs.I trust that the new Archbishop will be a man of integrity & full of courage & the Holy Spirit. Suffice to say that I don't envy him the task that lies ahead, but will add my prayers to the others here that the Lord has worked through men to find a worthy man to be His champion in the Anglican Communion.

Len. The word 'Church' does not appear in the Bible and I believe there is a good reason for this.

Sir, you possess a dogs slavish devotion to your on-line masters. Completely bereft of the ability to think for yourself, are you not ?

Laurence. A rather amusing clip. One could see himself there, asking for clarification of the message until it got dark...

Preacher. The Problems arise when leaders are appointed by men who have no spiritual discernment & the members of the 'Church' have no say in the matter. Their only options are to obey or seek fellowship elsewhere.

With ++Canterbury effectively being the governments placeman. Where would you suggest the faithful go to ?

"Blimey. How far we seem to have travelled from the stable in Bethlehem"

I wholeheartedly agree.

Even so, church titles are just fine with me, and I will respect what people want to be called or the titles they are assigned by their churches. As well as the office they represent.

I simply thought the capital "P" in "Prince of the Church" applied by a Anglican to an Archbishop of Canterbury was plagiarizing a title from the RC's and something a C of E cleric (especially a reincarnated Protestant martyr) would find highly objectionable.

My dear Inspector, why Wherever the true gospel is preached of course. Inside or outside the established places of Christian worship.Thus there have been many times that mankind have left the safety, custom & tradition of the 'Church', to seek a closer, deeper walk with Christ that their own ministers have either lost or never found, i.e John Wesley & his brother Charles were rejected by the mainstream Church of their day.The Lord himself was rejected by the Sanhedrin and so on.Regrettably many people no longer bother to read the Bible & digest its wisdom, but simply rely on being fed by others who sometimes appear to be hired shepherds or worse.It seems to me that many today are happier to produce converts rather than disciples, & the gospel in its fullness is not preached for fear of offending some.But I fear for the souls that are lost eternally through this expediency & also for those responsible when they have to answer to the Lord for their cowardice on the day of judgement.

A Happy New Year to all on HG`S august Blog,and a special thanks to HG for his thought provoking articles. May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.

Many of the comments on HG's article are rather critical of the current Archbishop of Canterbury. Until tonight I shared their views because every time I saw him on TV he seemed to waffle like a caricature of a pseudo-intellectual who mistakes obscurity for profundity. I sometimes wondered if he had ever read the verse, "For if the trumpet give an uncertain sound, who shall prepare himself to the battle?"

However, tonight I saw him on BBC2 delivering his New Year Message and then, immediately afterwards, there was an hour long programme "Goodbye to Canterbury" in which Williams talked about the history of the cathedral and what it stood for.

Both programmes were a revelation. The Archbishop spoke clearly and authoritatively. His message was profound and yet easy to understand showing that he does realise that it is possible to be appeal to the intellect and the heart at the same time.

Rebel Saint might disagree with me because the Archbishop said little that was explicitly about Christ but he was not speaking just to the converted or to those who are open to being converted. He was speaking to everyone including those who do not want to be converted and I think he might have planted seeds of doubt in the minds of some atheists and agnostics who watched the programmes and made them wonder if there is anything beyond this life.

OIG , "The Inspector viewed ‘Goodbye to Canterbury’ with you. Before we start asking whether Williams was hard done by, we need to know who wrote the script he narrated..."

I can assist you there Inspector - According to the program credits, it was WRITTEN and presented by Rowan Williams. Was there something you wished to say? - a gracious compliment to a decent and holy man perhaps?

It's too bad the C of E today doesn't have the courage of it's religious convictions it did in 1936 when it refused to allow the King-Emperor Edward VIII to marry a twice divorced American woman.

Back then it seemed the C of E still had a backbone. At least when it came to the Monarchy and it's behavior.

This national Church founded on divorce in the 1530's over 400 years later in 1936 had the moral courage to condemn divorce just as Jesus had when he said he "hated divorce". The C of E stood firm agaisnt it's Monarch marrying a divorced woman. Sadly only 30 years later the C of E had caved into every social, theological, and many left wing political fads that came down the pike including feminism and Gay issues. All of this would have been unthinkable a generation earlier.

Divore is now common in the Royal Family.

Had the C of E remained tough and stood by it's traditional beliefs it had stuck to until the late 1960's it would have probably kept the loyality of most of it's members which it has lost with less than 5% now attending church on any given Sunday today. The C of E could also have been the lynch pin in the eventual union of the ancient Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Churches and their own Anglican Church along with possibly the Lutheran Churches. That unity of Christendom would have been a formidable ethical force in the world today against the collapse today of public morals and a popular culture that is increasingly blatant in it's hatred of Christianity and all religion as well as bulwark in the coming crisus with of the West with Islamic Jihad.

Instead of being at the center of Christian unity the C of E selfishly threw the possibility of a united Christendom in the 21st century to the four winds in favor of fads and it's so called "middle way" trying to please and be everything to everyone. Common sense says that standing in the middle of a higway will only get you ironed out on the asphalt.

Preacher at 19:12 Regrettably many people no longer bother to read the Bible & digest its wisdom, but simply rely on being fed by others who sometimes appear to be hired shepherds or worse.

Dear fellow. That is totally the wrong way to go about it. Reading the bible can and does produce a ‘Holy Joe’ syndrome. We have a peculiar hopeless specimen on this site (…you know who you are, you finger pointing rascal !…)

A far better way is to obtain guidance from your local Catholic priest. He’s done the study time to understand the workings of it all. Reading the bible is a dreadful idea…

The good Archbishop unfortunately lost this mans confidence over the Sharia Law outrage. Although he never committed any more ‘wrong doing’ as such, he never did regain said confidence in full.

Look, have to be honest here. Wrote to his office at the time. Suggested he devote his time to leading his own flock and not worrying about ‘the others’. Before signing off, explained that as an RC, this man looked to the leader of the established Christian church to maintain the interests of ALL Christians residing in the Islands. Didn’t get a reply; hardly surprising as the correspondence on that matter must have been up to a million.

Actually, remembering now, it was a post card in rather bold handwriting. Asked his people to pin it to his notice board, in the “Don’t Forget” part…

Please don't forget that the three year liturgical cycle of the Catholic Church covers a great deal of scripture. It's actually a wonderful discipline to follow this and include the weekdays.

Catholics don't have the audacity to believe we are all equally qualified to understand scripture and I agree it takes study. We do recognise its value and necessity. However, we do not make an idol of it or believe we are all sufficiently educated to comprehend it.

I mean consider the early Church Fathers and some of the errors they made!

A far better way is to obtain guidance from your local Catholic priest. He’s done the study time to understand the workings of it all. Reading the bible is a dreadful idea…

A better description of RCism I have not read. If you actually read the Bible, you will start asking questions about the obvious disparities between Scripture & RC dogma. Far better to let the Priest just tell you what to believe. Although it is interesting that such advice would come from a self-professed RC who rejects so much RC teaching.

You point out absurdities in the Holy Bible of a donkey talking, as there are about a virgin birth and redemptions for killing a child to animals and back to a human being.

What Jesus did in his teachings, was to describe and to prove practical and livable, the way to find the truth to find the life to freedom. That is all. The method of unbabling the brain that latched onto religion for validation.

Peeling away the onion is relevant because the simple truths of the conscience will not be heard until the outer faith is riddiculed by reality.

So if being at the 'talking donkey' stage is true to you because 'your bible told you so'... it is not true. Have cry, examine the genetics of a donkey, let it go, then come back and we can discuss some more.

I was replying to David K on the previous topic.For yourself, to peel the first layer of the onion, I would be look at the genetics of a human being, mutual masturbation is not sex, and playing the role of sub and dom does not lead to marriage.

You do seem to be confused and in turn confusing me. On the one hand you wish to ignore a lot of the orthodoxies that your fellow christians here seem to take for granted (talking donkey, virgin birth, the christian concept of redemption), but then you still you seem to wish to use Jesus on the other hand as your authority for your opinions.

Except this is Jesus seems to have been turned into an eastern Guru, your claims about Jesus seems to be far removed from the Jesus the other Christians here claim him to have been.

So if you are confused, I am very confused by the christian version of the faith you share with us on this blog.

May I be so bold as to ask that I am certain if you read a transcript of the Mass there is very little you would find objectionable. Perhaps the exact words of the Consecration would be displeasing for you as a Calvinist but those words probably would not to cause much concern for modern Lutherans or most Anglicans. Other than those important words and their RC interpretation I am certain the words of the Mass could be said in your church at a service and few people would object. Don't forget every Mass has a reading from the Gospels, and the Epistles, as well as a sermon. Please remember too the words of the Mass have changed little, other than the addition of the Creed in the 4th century, since the early Chuech. This is my personal opinion and not any kind of theological statement.

For years I attended Mass a few times a year with my late wife who was RC. The RC Mass never registered in my mind being much different than the modern Episcopal Church services I remember after the changes in the Episcopal Church since the 1970's. After Vatican II the RC's added altars in their churches in order that the priest could face the congregation. It found it curious when I saw my Episcopalian parish, along with the rest of the Church, copy this RC Vatican II concept. They were influenced by Vatican II (at least outwardly) more than they will ever admit.

One of my few negative comments about Catholic religious services is that Roman Catholics can't sing. At least in English speaking countries. They were traditionally used to a choir doing all the work singing the Mass in Latin. As a boy in the 1950's when I went to Mass on Christmas with my mother who was RC (excommunicated because she married a Protestant) or sometimes with my maternal grandparents after they came to the USA I still have memories of the Latin Mass. As a boy I spent a few weeks in the summer staying with my grandparents and once visted NYC with them to stay with Czech friends they had there. A memory from that visit in 1959 is that I can still clearly recall attending a special High Mass at St Patrick's Cathedral in NYC with them where Mozart's Coronation Mass was sung with an orchestra. I was stunned by the beauty of that Mass. What a fantatstic experience to hear a Mozart Mass in a church as it was originally intended and not a convert hall or on the radio.

If you ever have the time. Please listen on Youtube to the "Gloria" from that Mozart Coronation Mass (or any Mass by a classical composer) sung by the Vienna Choir Boys accomopanied by an orchestra. Even more magnificent is this version on Youtube: W.A. Mozart: Gloria (Coronation Mass in C-major K317). Herbert von Karajan conducts The Vienna Philarmonic and The Vienna Singverein. Sung at St. Peter's St. Basilica in the Vatican at a High Mass celebrated by the late John Paul II.

Anglicans and Protestants know how to sung hymns and do a fantastic job of it.

By the way, here are a few of my favorite Protestant hymns. "Abide With Me", "How Great Thou Art", and the very non Episcopalian/ Anglcan "A Mighty Fortress is Our God". These and many others along with anything sung by an English Cathedral boys choir.

Do you know, a fellow could warm to you, in time. Despite your chilling Calvinistic outlook…

you actually read the Bible, you will start asking questions about the obvious disparities between Scripture & RC dogma.

A dogma INSPIRED by Scripture. The word has grown, you know. The world has grown too.

Although it is interesting that such advice would come from a self-professed RC who rejects so much RC teaching.

The Inspector is an extremely honest man. He refuses to bear false witness to anybody including himself. This man has ‘trouble’ with some of it, to be sure. Quite open about that. But he does not want to be expelled from the community, or to leave it, or to leave it and take others with him, or to set up a new community like protestants do. In other words, it’s a private matter between him and God. Besides, the ‘rejects so much of RC teaching’ is your opinion, is it not ?

I was raised Lutheran. I have in the past been in RC churches during a Mass, and knew virtually every word without the Missal. My problems with RCism stem not from the formal liturgy, but from the extra-Scriptural dogmas that cluster around Rome like mould around rotting food.

The Method to UnJew a Jew, is the same to UnMohamadan a Mohamadan, to UnHomoeroticise the Homoeroticised, to UnChristianise the Christianised.

Before they came along, there were children of all creeds and hues, also subjected to different Gods and Demons. So it is business as usual. The churches no different than the Synagogues Jesus entered. The priests and rabbis say the same platitudes, and offer the same exclusive places in Heaven. And you are still beholden to pay the pipers for your ticket.

So "The Way" is to get your head out of the same clouds...

Forgiveness, love, repentence, poor in spirit, like little child, wise as serpent.... Does this give you any clues?

No one knows God. The only truth you can find is about is your attitude; is someone who strikes you with intimidation then going to ruin your whole day? Are they going to continue to pick on you because your breastplate of righteousness is only one Saul thick, one that gleams in a Church, so they know you will transfer your loyalty to any Bully who has the Greater Force. A Nation of Converts is one of degeneracy. Know them by their fruit.

If your righteousness is for righteousness sake only, then they will not dare come at you, for you cannot be bought by any ransom, by any price, so it be like shaking a lions tail. They do not want the hassel. Far better to go among the Believers who left their common sense at home to believe any lie, no matter how preposterous, if it is someone in Authority that tells them so.

That is why I came here, to see if anyone had grasped what Jesus had done, whilst alive, and passed his liberation-message on to his disciples so they had the same insight he had. That they, like the Knights of the Round Table, went forth, and their tales were written in books that were burned or are still hidden under sand and stone.

The wide number of accounts of Jesus, point to an individual, and not to A Holy God. An individual who sought the unindoctination of his tribe and the protection of those children from religion.

If you don't give up your fears of what you know nothing about, you won't appreciate real life. You live in a fragile parallel universe. Rubbing your genie lamp, or your loins, for an identity, will only make you go blind.

Jesus did, and behaved accordingly. Merely presenting Jesus as just an inspired man doesn’t cut it. He joins a long list no doubt

You are an uber man Sir. You know great purity, and do not walk the path of the ordinary soul. You are not weak, pathetic, greedy, violent, slovenly, vain, proud like the rest of us to some degree. So, your message is ultimately worthless, because their is no HOPE. We are far too unworthy for that, as you point out, again to some degree, each time we hear from you. There is NO escape for us wretches, and here you are, reminding us of that...

Then this means you don't. You could have said God was within you, or you lived by very word of God. But you didn't. Complete silence. Yet in the next breath, in a book you'd read, you claimed somebody else did, and champion that as salvation.

OiG "...and behaved accordingly."

Because my Koran told me so.

This is no more than swearing that the Buddha found Nirvana, and by faith in copying, you can hang on his coat tails.

Take what Jesus was claimed to have said about marriage: 'Moses made divorce easy, because you can't tough it out to learn to become unselfish, unegoed, unidentified... But I say only if the other person has enjoined themselves to another through intercourse, can you tell them to go to hell'

Which sounds pretty good, as most marriages are a suffering to wake up to your own selfishness and not use the other for your vanity... But what if you have children? Will divorce protect them or divide them. You can't flick though the pages of scripture to find out. You can only know what is right in your heart and head and follow that course. Many have reconciled and become stronger.

Paper-followers have no authority and are not the rock you speak so authoritively about having lived 2000 years ago, because they are not a rock - knowing for themselves what to do too.

As the Catholic church set itself up(so to speak)firstly with the 'Donation of Constantine'then when that was found to be a forgery had to look elsewhere for something[anything] to validate its fraudulent claims.The Catholic Church decided to hijack 'the Rock statement'( which scripture proves is Christ not Peter and never was.)It is enlightening to know that NONE of the early 'Church Fathers' made the false claim about Peter being' the Rock'...NONE.

I have no problem with anyone exercising their free will and setting up a 'religious organisation'but problems arise when they call themselves the' only way to God'because by doing that they usurp the only true way to God which is Jesus Christ Himself.

lenJust the same simplistic nonsense you've been posting since joining this blog.

Grow up and move on, do.

CarlI can understand each of the 12 points you list. You will also know a Catholic would answer that each does have a scriptural root. As a man who questions his faith, discusses issues sensibly with others and reads scripture you'll know both sides of these differences.

I am not sufficiently versed to go through each point - and, in any case, it would be polemical and apologetic. There are plenty of sound Roman Catholic sites that do this for anyone who's interested.

I often refer to Origen's 'theory' of the transmigration of souls which he speculated was based on scriptural references to Elijah and John the Baptist. A great founding Doctor of the Christian Church who took a couple of references to Elijah and John the Baptist and came up with a 'theology' we now know to be heretical.

As for Tradition, who says the Church keeps this secret? In each of the dogmas and doctrines defined by the Church the three pillars of scripture, reason and tradition are all referred to in great detail. None of it is hidden and all the teachings are spelt out in great detail.

One final thing. The Catholic Church does not discourage the reading of scripture. It does recognise that in the wrong hands it is a book that can be misunderstood and misused. Just look at the history of so many breakaway cults and sects for justification of this.

OiG: As for saying ‘God is within us’. No he isn’t. If he was within us we would be God too.

If god was not in you, you could never know god.

If love was not in you...

If truth was not in you...

So how do you heal a person who, like a Pope John Paul, used to self-flagelate to distraction?

By facing the real pain of conscience, that "god-within-you"that had only departed when, as a child, you were scolded for seeing the 'Emperor had no clothes on' because it got you into trouble, that to memorize a book to regurgitate made you clever and respected, so you were led by your intellect, thus made so anyone, anyone could reprogramme and hypnotise you, and you'd think your faith was your own volition! As in The Art of War, it was the only retreat left open for you.

Christians poor, Church fabulously wealthy; Socialists poor, government officals fabulously wealthy. A flock, and proud to be told so!

So a man like Jesus, teaching you to think for yourself, to not resent or get upset, took the power away from the priests and officials whose only power is that of intimidation. They force you to walk one mile, you walk two.

OiG: As for saying ‘God is within us’. No he isn’t. If he was within us we would be God too.

“Has it not been written in your Law, ‘I SAID, YOU ARE GODS’? ...(John 10:30-36 NASB)

“Do not call anyone on earth your father; for One is your Father, He who is in heaven.” (Matthew 23:9 NASB)

“I am ascending to My Father and your Father, and to My God and your God.” (John 20:17 NASB)

"See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are!" (1 John 3:1 NASB)

OiG: "This man absolutely refutes that mankind has been created to suffer a lifelong guilt trip. If you wish to ride one through life, that is your free given choice."

We agree then, that "Original Sin" is a fraud, that children are born pure and waiting upon love and instruction to cope with the world. And if you want to blame other people or the Devil for your woes, well, that is your own choice and don't drag any children down with you - as it would be better to put a mill-stone around your neck and throw you in the sea.

Of course, one can dismiss the possibility that you are here to mock us, can’t one…

Feeling a little unsettled? A chink in the Religeous Ardor?

So, why do you feel so inadequate you come here to spread your fears amongst us ?

Ah, that word "fear," that feeling that most people rush to avoid and bury their head into the pleasures of paradise on Earth and in Heaven.

Fear cannot be transmitted if you faced your fears... just as Jesus faced his demons too. (Though, I've got to admit, I would never have felt tempted by anyone offering me the chance to rule the whole world, I mean, I would just laugh at them! But Jesus was sorely tempted by this offer. Boy, what an ego he must have had at the time to deal with. Forty days and nights of Cold Turkey. Thank goodness he did turn it down. If he hadn't, he would have become a St Paul or a Mohammad and came forth saying: "God spoke to me, and appointed me, to lead you... etc etc."

Jesus teaches you how to get out of your own upset, Mohammad teaches you how to make others upset to gain a sense of superior about your physical attributes of birth. One makes you examine yourself as lacking, the other makes you examine everyone else as lacking. One says the humblest among you should be honored, the other says the proudest among you should be honored.

One pushes you back onto yourself to find the truth that sets you free, the other forces children to rock and recite chapters and verses. One calls you "friend" the other calls you servant.

Kinderling. You are well on your way to becoming an Eastern style holy man, aren’t you. Good for you !

How did you start, shadowing a guru or a correspondence course ? Do you sit in the shade all day cooling yourself while your fellows break their backs in the fields. Do they give you alms into return for your words of wisdom ?

It must cause you grief to know that thanks to education and a greater awareness of people, the punters have mainly seen through holy charlatans. But there will always be stupid people in the world, what ! See enough of them where this man lives.

So what is the modus operandi. First, you give them something they don’t need, solutions to problems they haven’t got. Or perhaps you pray on their insecurities, fears, wants, problems. You offer a ‘spiritual’ way out. You’ve now got them hooked. And it’s for life, because come wind or rain or hail or snow, you never give them the FINAL solution / piece of advice. Oh no, you’ve a nice little number going, and you can string them along for years. And when one of their grievances shows sign of getting better, you find another one.

But surely, and one feels you will agree most heartedly on this final point, the greatest feeling is when one of your victims brings their young child to meet you. For then, the next generation is yours too. By their adulthood hood, you will be old and white haired, but none the less in remarkably good condition. Not having to labour for your bread has seen to that.

By the way, the Inspector will keep it a secret he’s rumbled you. Wouldn’t want to take a fellows rice bowl away. Mums the word !

Kinderling. Condemning organised religion are you ? Well, you do have a point as such, but then again, it’s the best available to us mere humans. Are you favouring ‘God within us all’ so we can find our own truth individually. Doesn’t work you know, no continuity. It’s whatever the individual thinsk or concludes on each occasion. When he’s gone, the next one starts from scratch. Waste of time, don’t you think ?

And what’s all this ‘born again’ business. Are you suggesting that nature has it wrong when we are born the first time ? What you mean to say is every one of us needs to go on a spiritual journey, of course...

oig; "Are you favouring ‘God within us all’ so we can find our own truth individually. Doesn’t work you know, no continuity."

You can't find your own truth individually? Well, at least you admit being not able to seek and find... to remain a perculiar armchair referee.

While Avi can't even find the truth when he claims to hold it collectively.

Where did wisdom go? On to the sleeve and within the pebble in the shoe. To see no evil and sense no evil in the resigned acceptance that Gods and Fate had dealt their hands, and nothing can be changed.

... First, you give them something they don’t need, solutions to problems they haven’t got. Or perhaps you pray on their insecurities, fears, wants, problems. You offer a ‘spiritual’ way out. You’ve now got them hooked. And it’s for life, because come wind or rain or hail or snow, you never give them the FINAL solution / piece of advice. Oh no, you’ve a nice little number going, and you can string them along for years. And when one of their grievances shows sign of getting better, you find another one.

But surely, and one feels you will agree most heartedly on this final point, the greatest feeling is when one of your victims brings their young child to meet you. For then, the next generation is yours too. By their adulthood hood, you will be old and white haired, but none the less in remarkably good condition. Not having to labour for your bread has seen to that.

Oh my ... you have perfectly described the clergy/laity system in Christianity, and truly in all religions. The clergy who successfully prey on the laity, the lazy laity who want a savior to save them from life, and the clergy, only too willing to oblige, because as you correctly stated, there will never be a FINAL solution or piece of advice. Because the laity don't really want to hear it! They WANT to keep depending on the clergy, because they never want to be responsible for their own lives. They don't have it in themselves. Jeeeesus, take the wheel, Father forgive me, for I have sinned, kiss the Pope's ring, Your Grace, Your Honor, "Father" Flannery (yet call no man father), Your Worship, etc, etc.

Olive Jones. Since discovering this excellent blog, the Inspector now places matters religious at the to of his priorities. It wasn’t always this way. Mankind is born, he grows and then he has a family and provides for them. He has little time to ponder his spiritual side, and if he’s particularly thick, he wouldn’t even know he has one. He goes to church an hour a week, hears the truth and instructions by which to conduct his life, and then he rests. For the next six days a week, he toils.

The Inspector has a prized book. Collins Dictionary of Quotations. 792 pages of small text, with just about every worthwhile saying man has come up with. He could quote from that book for the next 20 years and still not exhaust the material in it. What a terror he would be if he did that, what ! Well, smart arse would be a better description.

Now, if you are going to proceed down that route, you have to have the ability to slip the quotes in to garnish what you have to say. If you rely too heavily on your source text and include them out of context, viewers of your work are going to say “I have no idea what he’s on about”

So there we have it. You posting posting other men's words, and nobody can understand you.

So you are saying that the average human being is a zombie, and a cowering slave to the boogey-men in his imaginations and needs a savior/priest/mullah to tell him the "truth," that there is an all-powerful loving Being in the sky somewhere (Jehovah God), and he loves you, and now you must behave a certain way and conduct your life accordingly or you better watch out cuz Santa Claus is comin' to town? So he can continue to toil for his family, tithe his clergy on Sunday, get a little "spirituality" going on for an hour on Sunday, and rest assured that he doesn't have to really think about anything too much, and the fact that his son is a crack addict and his daughter is being passed around by pimps, well, the answers lie with the clergy, and its all in Jesus' hands, anyway.

How can you say a human being has little time to ponder his spiritual side? That's all we've been doing since we've been on the planet. Some of us anyway. We are born with a "spiritual side" and everything we do in life, work, relate to people, marry, have families, take care of people, make mistakes, it's all spiritual and has consequences ... wow. What a poor life you just described. It's like never doing anything for yourself, no first hand experience or knowledge! You can't believe that giving the most precious part of your very life, your "soul," your ability to think and reason and come to your own conclusions, to develop your conscience, you can't leave that to some learned power-mongering manipulative religious vampire who tells you God won't be pleased unless you wipe your bum a certain way!

If there were a "G_d," I think he/she/it/they would be upset about man's cowardice, his burying every innate talent in the ground out of fear of taking responsibility for himself and his life, never to be used except as payment for a few crusty words on Sunday from the clergy.

Olive Jones. A fellow does like some stinging derision on a quiet Sunday afternoon...

his son is a crack addict and his daughter is being passed around by pimps

...and hyperbole too ! We both know that families who attend church once a week are far less likely to suffer those problems, don’t we ? Indeed, that’s the kind of behaviour you liberated types go in for. After all, if there is no God, anything goes, until it goes wrong, then you come to the rest of us and plead for help.

How can you say a human being has little time to ponder his spiritual side?

The Inspector has done some research on IQ over the last 18 months. He believes that only 40% of the population acknowledge a spiritual side to their existence. Everybody else lives hand to mouth. They are actually frightened of their inner soul. For a great many, they get round this by worshipping at a football club. An artificial solution to their wants, and they can SEE the objects of their devotion, kicking a ball around.

Always interesting when someone on what God would think, don’t you find ? Of course, their answer reflects THEIR take on humanity. Yours is full of disappointment...

After all, if there is no God, anything goes, until it goes wrong, then you come to the rest of us and plead for help.

Why do you think that if there is no God, anything goes? I can't speak for "atheists," but everything I've read that they have written contradicts this. Many are much more moral and kind than Christians.

Is it the IQ thing, low IQ people need a Policeman in the Sky threatening them with Hell before they will behave and do the common sense things which any child could probably figure out? Is it the low IQ people who need religions and gods and saviors to believe in? Is that what you're saying?

The Inspector has done some research on IQ over the last 18 months. He believes that only 40% of the population acknowledge a spiritual side to their existence.

What's this got to do with the time to ponder the spirituality of one's existence, and not having any because we are so busy, busy busy?

And whether one acknowledges the spirituality of our lives or not, it doesn't matter. The fact is that it exists. Homo sapiens are spiritual beings, we have self-consciousness and we have a conscience, and the deeds we do and do not do have spiritual (i.e., emotional, moral, physical, etc) ramifications and consequences. IQ has nothing to do with one's "spirituality."

[...] They are actually frightened of their inner soul. For a great many, they get round this by worshipping at a football club. An artificial solution to their wants, and they can SEE the objects of their devotion, kicking a ball around.

Yes, they worship at the football club because they are frightened of their inner soul. They worship the rock stars and the rap stars. They also worship at the churches and give their soul over to Pastor Pervert because they are frightened of their inner soul, and even more, their responsibility for it! Also an artificial solution to their wants. Jesus was slain in their place. Phew! Hallelujah for that hour a week falling asleep in the Pews with a ticket to heaven. And the children, who see this emptiness, this farce, but don't know how to deal with it, are in the bathroom, smoking pot, getting their bit of heavenly escape, just like hypocrit dad and mom.

"The belief that a cosmic Jewish Zombie who was his own father can make you live forever if you symbolically eat his flesh and telepathically tell him you accept him as your master, so he can remove an evil force from your soul that is present in humanity because a rib-woman was convinced by a talking snake to eat from a magical tree."

Kinderling, what would you do with those who are entirely of this world ? Isn’t their world all the poorer without a spiritual side for these people. When you read about their problems, then surely your condemnation of them are nothing to their unhappiness ?

Or is it once again, God’s creation is far more judgemental of his brother than God would ever be...

I am not posting as anyone else. The perspectives of a Christian realizing Jesus teachings are the stumbling block to the very religion are not mine alone. Thomas Jefferson wrote his own bible in an attempt to rid it of the falacies.

Oig "what would you do with those who are entirely of this world?"

For those who seek to hear, help them become objective.

Who wishes to see someone self-harming, and then when made ill and impoverished watch the Health Services give drugs and Benefits to remove the symptoms?

Who wants a Mankind who will kill and kiss on the whims of a leadership?

Who wants to remove discernment, by calling it judgement, in a society where ignorance is praised as goodness?

Your 'spiritual' side is the David Icke world of dimensions you do not live in, yet claim to control your life. It embraces the Wicca and the Rain Dancer. ...surely your condemnation of them are nothing to their unhappiness ?

If they were true, they would not be harmed by criticism, but with the fruit of healthy and productive lifestyles they would be envied and want to be taxed by lesser people.

Why DON’T you think that if one is an atheist, anything goes. They have just their own moral code, and usually no one else’s, so it would be a mere formality to incorporate whatever it is they have in mind into it. On occasion, to minimise any chance of unwanted guilt, they insert a caveat. For example “I’m happy to indulge in infidelity, so long as no one gets hurt”. Used to be a very popular one that, amongst the liberated, a few decades ago.

What’s this guff about a Sky Policeman. Surely if you believe, you would want to comply with God’s wishes as an act of worship. Curious thought though, that we faithful need the carrot and stick approach just ‘to make sure’ and keep us even…

Now you must admit that a low IQ is a handicap to reasoned thought. Forget any nonsense you read about the human race only using 10% of its brain capacity. We use all we have. And if there isn’t enough neurons for thought processing, you do without.

Ah, that’s nice. We both agree that the typical football fan and the music fan are frightened of their inner souls. Hardly surprising. If you don’t get them into church at an early age to ponder God’s house, how DO you introduce them to the concept that there exists a dimension greater than yourself, and it’s not a damn football club or latest boy group.

The rest of your post is just you getting angry. (Yes, one accepts he lied at the start, but you were raging enough as it was, and the Inspector was / is hoping to avoid ad hominem)

Kinderling, some advice old fellow. Never, ever include David Icke’s name in amongst your unconventional ramblings. Think about why not…

Anyway, it just shows the Inspector was over ambitious thinking you could manage ‘some of the people, some of the time’. Well have to down step to you convincing ‘one or two people, once or twice’ to begin with.

Tell you what, you get yourself over to ‘secular café’ and chat with the 17 year old boy philosophers. They’ll end up following you as if you were a cross between the pied piper of Hameln and Jimmy Savile.

I wouldn't bother trying to understand Kinderling or Olive. I cannot engage with people, who really do not explain themselves in a coherent fashion. (not a personal attack, I just cannot understand what you two are on about).

If you go to skeptic's websites, they demolish religion through comparative religious history, and they are right: humans look for comfort and solace in Gods, to bargain that if they serve them exclusively so they will come under their protection and prosper.

Fair enough. What skeptics do not see is that sexual identity too is a giving of power to a provider, and an enabling priestcraft like Outrage who make a living off evangelising their creed. As if Religion and sexuality were fixed!

A child who never heard of your religion will live a full and happy life. Period.

If you can add more light, more conscience to their universe, by all means bring out your science and wisdom to be tested in the open.

But if all you have is hearsay from a book of selected authors and a life not experienced because during the week you went to the same office and at the weekend the same church... Well, you have not lived and met the wonderful varieties of minds and the essence of how they work.

'To help the least among you is to help me'. That is all.

I cannot think why this is confusing, except if you are brainwashed.

Just criticise your own religion by the same standard you criticise others. Mock your magical events as you mock theirs.

Hannah, there’s a good girl, refreshingly defiant in your youth. By the way Kinderling has horns and a tail. That’s what the years of experience the Inspector has can tell you. He offers you fruit, take it if your inexperience tells you it is safe !

"Gabriel said to the heaven gate-keeper, 'Open the gate.' The gatekeeper asked, 'Who is it?' He said, 'Gabriel.' The gate-keeper,' Who is accompanying you?' Gabriel said, 'Muhammad.' The gate-keeper said, 'Has he been called?' Gabriel said, 'Yes.' Then it was said, 'He is welcomed. What a wonderful visit his is!' Then I met Adam and greeted him and he said, 'You are welcomed O son and a Prophet.'"

Or Jesus,"While they watched, Jesus’ appearance was changed; his face became bright like the sun, and his clothes became white as light. Then Moses and Elijah[a] appeared to them, talking with Jesus.

But let's say the Hadith page got mixed up with the Bible page and so now Jesus went with Gabriel to Heaven and Mohammad stood with Moses and Elijah.

If it were in your Holy Book, you would STILL riddicule the other's absurdity, and your religion would not have changed one iota.

If Mohammad had healed the sick and Jesus raped women as war booty, now that would be a difference worth noting.

Be off with you Kinderling - we now all know what you are about. You slithered in to this Christian site, your forked tongue moving in and out of your mouth mesmerising those who saw your approach. Be gone now, foul serpent. Where it available to the Inspector, a forked branch, he would pin your head to the ground...

This is a Christian site, he states. Priest-led laity, true; but no disciples.

Unable to hold and argument over the teachings of Jesus, but the Worshipping The Holiness of a man who himself said you should never consider him good.

For it is not goodness to seek, like a person seeking happiness, but the way to the truth to the life that Jesus demonstrated you had to follow... if you ever wanted to finally get out of what you had got into because it was killing you.

Mohammad and Jesus cannot be exchanged, that is obvious by observing their conduct. What they taught also cannot be switched, for one path leads to complete submission and the other complete freedom.

However, Jesus was turned into a death-cult so it's Followers resemble no more or less than a Jew or a Muslim of today, awaiting their place in Heaven in their blasphemy of disatisfaction of god's world that they beleive should be destroyed, in the presence of The Presence, and reciting oaths into the ears of an upset child.

Children already know the kingdom of god is here, they don't need to be taught it, and so they must be protected to grow straight, so they do not need any more Jesuses to show them the way out. No more courageous people to put their lives down for others when the True Followers picked up forked branches to strike the other in righteous condemnation for disagrement.

To your demons, your temptations (and do not let others tempt you to follow theirs) you might say “Away from me, Satan! For it is written: ‘Worship the Lord your God, and serve him only.'

Well that's clear, worship your god with all your heart, mind and soul... but then add the prophet is also to be worshipped? The messenger gets an equal seat with God? To stand in the position you should have been, thus preventing you ever becoming a messenger too? So Catholics are shaped by the God-Jesus and Protestants are shaped by Catholics, and Baptist Free Churches are shaped by Protestants, and Unitarians are shaped by... all by messengers.

‘Worship the Lord your God, and serve him only.' Love the energy, the source of life of the universe, that made you. Where Jesus was connected, sure, the best of men in his day, killed like the prophets of truth before him and the prophets of truth today. Tend to those who make you realize for yourself that you are gods, "friends," equals, and reject those who would make you slaves for they cannot reveal the teachings for themsleves.

Not the 'someone-else-told-me-so-out-of-fear' Revealed Truth; not the 'go-along-to-get-along Approval Truth; but the 'I-faced-my-fear-to-go-it-alone' revealed truth. The truth of courage, not the truth of convenience.

You stand as a human being, a product of billions of years of evolution, a primate with self consciousness, to be able to find out for yourself how the world was made... but chose a 2000 year old Holy Book based on an earlier 4000 year old Holy Book to serve it literally, rather than observe the construction of a blood-for-sin cult to avoid everlasting damnation. How could you have debased Jesus into a Blood Sacrifice for all your sins?

Mark 16:17- 19"And these signs shall follow them that believe; In my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues;

They shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.

So then after the Lord had spoken unto them, he was received up into heaven, and sat on the right hand of God."

Please, tell me Dodo and OiG that you do all this that the Holy Bible clearly stated, and I will stop writing right now. Period. Or else you stop writing and go and get real life.

Because it is what I observe. I know "atheists" whose morals are much higher (according to the Christian scale) than many Christians and other "religious" people. People have a conscience, and you don't need to go to church or to be a Christian or to be a part of organized religion to follow it.

Curious thought though, that we faithful need the carrot and stick approach just ‘to make sure’ and keep us even…

Yes, they are afraid of hellfire. Or they are attracted by the "love" and "forgiveness" of the whole thing. Of course it is carrot and stick.

If you don’t get them into church at an early age to ponder God’s house, how DO you introduce them to the concept that there exists a dimension greater than yourself, and it’s not a damn football club or latest boy group.

See, this is what I don't understand. Why do they have to get into "God's house" to ponder a "dimension" greater than yourself? Honestly, 12 year olds do this when they look at the sky.

The person who worships at the feet of the footballer is the same as the person who worships at the feet of the rock/rap star is the same as the person who worships at the feet of a black president is the same as the person who worships at the feet of Jesus or somebody else's idea of "God." The act of worshipping cuts you off from your very self, from the treasure you have inside yourself, from becoming a fully conscious human being responsible for your life. The footballer, the rap star, the black president, Jesus, they all "made it." And the worshipper wants a piece of it. Jesus just happens to be your particular sacred cow.

All I am saying is just because something appears "good" doesn't mean it is. Jesus said "Don't call me good." In the beginning there was the Tree of the Knowledge of GOOD (and evil), and there was The Tree of LIFE. There is a profound difference between the two, and that's what I'm talking about.

Kinderling. Fathom out God and our relationship to him and each other by all means short of driving yourself insane. You are making yourself ill when you dissect the bible, but you are not alone in that, to be sure. Roman Catholic laity don’t read the bible as a rule, we were encouraged to leave that to our priests.

Your 'I-faced-my-fear-to-go-it-alone' is causing you distress and grief. And fool, you actually endorse that way for others too !

Olive Jones. So you are a humanist. Interesting theories they have. Belief that the human individual is the highest form of life in the universe. That each individual is worthy, even the ones out to kill you, and that there is no such idea as sin. That is, of course, just individuals ‘expressing’ themselves, and it is good, apparently. You just have to hope you are not on the receiving end of it…

The Inspector was very close to such a humanist 30 years ago. She didn’t find contentment in that and further went into Wicca. All Wicca people are humanists. And all humanists eventually drift into embracing the forces of nature, which they call Wicca. She picked up this muck while at university. She was born a Welsh Methodist. Ruined her life really, going to university. Best thing this man never did, going to one of those places when an impressionable and callow young man…

In my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues;They shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover."

You're not a Christian OiG or Dodo. At least, established by the tenents of this scripture in its version of A Holy Book.

OiG"You are making yourself ill when you dissect the bible...Roman Catholic laity don’t read the bible as a rule, we were encouraged to leave that to our priests"

Yep, and it is no joke, that you leave the children in the hands of your priests. I encourage you therefore, to protect the impressionable, to read the Bible for yourself and throw out all the garbage in it.

OiG: Your 'I-faced-my-fear-to-go-it-alone' is causing you distress and grief.

No, done that, been there, moved on; just as the homosexual has to face the stress when they were a child to get out of what they got fixated to for comfort; the drug addict to undergo cold turkey to reveal the attitude of what they sought comfort from; and Jesus had to undergo forty days and forty nights to remove what he got pride into.

What did you face up to about yourself? Or were you perfect. Or did you leap upon a religion that takes care of it for you, of past deeds you can cover with the Blood of Christ, light a candle, pray to the Mother of God, recite the Rosary, suck in the incense.

You're right. Catholicism is a rich hutch if you don't think about it.

Dodo,

Having never studied Islamic Sufism and Judaic Kabalism I do not know what they write or do. But I guess you are saying they are on a kinder and more humane path than their mainstream kinsfolk who would have them exterminated for God if they could.

Please enlighten me on what they have in common with 'discovering the truth that sets you free'.

Kinderling. You are alight with the joys of evangelism. Good for you, but the Inspector considers evangelists to be a tiresome lot. One hopes that one day you will see it as it is. To wit, God in his heaven and his imperfect creation on earth. When you awake in the morning, wave to God in the sky, don’t fall to your belly and cry “Why am I alive. I am not worthy”

God knows what we are about. He doesn’t expect mental anguish from the likes of you in an effort to apologise for being born...

The Inspector was very close to such a humanist 30 years ago. She didn’t find contentment in that and further went into Wicca.

LOL! You are funny ... If I am not "into" Christianity any more, what makes you think I would get into Wiccanism, or anything else, for that matter? I am very content, because I have found the Truth, the Life and the Way within me. I need nothing more. It's very simple, really.

That each individual is worthy, even the ones out to kill you, and that there is no such idea as sin.

Believe me, Inspector ... If someone is trying to kill me, or to kill others, I have absolutely no qualms about doing unto him that which he attempteth to doeth unto me. Long live the Second Amendment!

My parents are basically different forms of nominal Protestants, just like you have nominal Catholics, nominal Muslims, nominal Jews, etc. Just something to check off under "religion" when you join the military or go into a hospital ... :)

What were your parents? Did you conform to their beliefs, or rebel against them?

We are agreed then you are not a Christian. All that effort in the Bible to free minds must be, yawn, very tiring. A little dangerous too, I hear.

Dodo,

My parents were average none believers of any religion, working hard, making their money work. Except a childhood of being seen and not heard, a beating to instill conformity, and parents who could not relate to children, nothing my disturbed sibblings could handle in adulthood.

So I guess not wanting to be like my father to join Islam, or like my mother to join Socialism, or inverted to join Outrage! simply left me no choice but seek out what Jesus had discovered for himself in dealing with bullies enabled by those who kept their heads down.

Forgiveness.

I did not need to receive it, I needed to give it, to forgive them for they did not know what they did.

That was all. No getting Allah or a Savior to justify or treat me like a baby to tell me I'm safe now if I lived behind a wall of denial by making up for my resentments instead - by being good by following the precise dictacts of my Faith. To forget the old person and put on the new. A convert.

The human brain is not built like that.

So no Separate External God, just a thank you to Roy Masters teaching a meditation-observation excercise for the left brain I suppressed to forget my father's voice, to remember past resentments and in a moment of repentence of playing God, let go; and Jesus, whom I could now understand, was using both hemispheres of his brain to confound the half-brained, for showing the way out of religion.

Ah, Kinderling, I see. You're a devout follower of Roy Masters, formerly Reuben Obermeister, once a nice Jewish boy in the diamond cutting business who went off the derekh, toyed with African witchery and hypnotism, declares himself Christian and equal to Jesus and is now a leader of what some say is a dangerous, but what everyone can agree on is an otherwise fairly lucrative cult. Understandable; the diamond cutting business is not what it used to be, now that that the Indians have undercut (pardon the poor pun) our brethren in Joburg, Amsterdam, London and New York. Could have saved Dodo and the Inspector a lot of time by declaring your, uh, affiliation from the start hmmm?

In any case, if you're one of Reuben's little emissaries, you're doing a horribly fer-kakkener job and perhaps you need the old chatlattan to do a little juju exorcism on you with his stick cross like here. Or is that you, the chap with the moustache, rolling eyes and tongue issues (0:40 to 0:56)?

Roy is like that. I think he perceives himself as another St Paul - a Jew made good. He realized as a hypnotist, that most of Christianity is suggestion, that he had the ability to use this conditioning back on them, to demonstrate and explain what he was doing, to see that most people are caught up in their thoughts and fears.

He developed a method of sitting still, to let yourself listen to the chatter of your mind, to watch the thoughts have less of a hold, until you cannot be hypnotised by words any longer. He has made a secular meditation excercise for those traumatized in the Army, those who would have ended up on the sidewalk in poverty unable to live with themselves for what they had done.

Of course the sick and disturbed came to him to be healed. Of course many just wanted to copy him to make it easy for an armchair-ride Super-Christianity.

But unlike Buddhism or Transendental Meditation used to avoid the noise for a place in Nirvana, Roy recognized you needed to feel the pain, to know the truth, repent, forgive, to weep, and be set free. He realized you could unhypnotise yourself just by sitting still in God's Presence and looking at your deepest resentments. Or get caught up with worship and prayers and Bible study.

Roy believes God sent Jesus to Earth to give us God's message to love one another. I believe Jesus was a product of his time, a normal person in extrodinary circumstances just as Socrates was five hundred years before him a normal person and I'm sure many more have revealed their truths and have been hated, riddiculed and silenced for them.

Your beliefs change as you experience and learn more.

I am interested in the two brain hemispheres talking properly to each other, and if you make one dominant over the other, like lazy only-right handed people or lazy only-left handed people, then you have the credulity in religions we see today... just because one half of the brain is suppressed or underwhelmed and the other over-excited, most often in religious childhood.

At the moment I am listening to Richard Carrier, a Historian discuss The Christian Delusion, having enjoyed so much of the Late Christopher Hitchen. As I said, I admire anyone who is sincere, and have their story to tell from their journey of self-discovery. I do not have to agree with them, but will take the gold nuggets with me.

I have no religion. I believe in the way to the truth to the life because I saw my resentment towards my father, buried and suppressed so I did not use my left brain as I would hear his voice each time I used it. My mother's right brain voice was my allegence. To him I went and sat down and apologised. For me, I saw an older man who had changed. I could now use that brain once more, without feeling intimidated that he had abused his.

It worked for me. That's all I can share. I'm a one man band, wishing you would be too, to be a friend of Jesus' and not a counterfeit person.

Why should I knock Transendental Meditation? Well, the clue's in the name. If I put you in a darkened room for half an hour and then took you into sunlight, you'd be blinking and distracted that this was awesome, and keep doing it to yourself.Why knock Churchianity? Because the guilt and unworthiness in Church makes you feel released for the week. To burn your finger and put it in cold water for the pleasure of distraction.

To get away from the cycle of needing more meditation or more faith. You only need to realize once, and you will never fall back. The truth sets you free, not the allegence.

I appreciate your candor and what appears to me your first statements in a clear, standard language, Kinderling. Such things are important here and in life.

It's not for me to argue down another man's beliefs or un-beliefs, as we each have our own burdens and paths, but I will opine that reliance on solitary charismatics with a cadre of devotees of whatever religion, including mine, presents grave risks. I've no doubt that you feel that "something worked for you." If these personalities weren't able to produce what people want or think they need, they wouldn't be who they are, but from my experience gained by going around the block a few times, I know that the costs ultimately outweight the gains.

I won't debate philosophies on life and the nature of beliefs with you right now if ever, but I will remark that the brain "science" Roy has developed all by his lonesome self is sheer shlock. Yes, left-right brain hemisphere functions and differences are well established by now and have helped us understand types of creativity and even to mitigate certain learning disability syndromes, but the odd conclusions Roy draws are empirically indefensible. Ditto for his speculation on energy from magnetism, which is just another variation on the perpetuum mobile, or put in plainer terms, getting something from nothing...or a lot from very little. And this is the crux of the problem with what charismatics offer, the promise of getting a lot...a tectonic spiritual or personality change...for very little; their half-baked, always derivative and poorly cobbled together theories and thought or behaviour modification methods. Mind you, the only part that needs to work in their "system" is the one that gathers a critical mass of adherents and produces sufficient income.

Since you and everyone here offers advice, I will offer mine. There are a million ways for us to salve our wounds and improve ourselves, Kinderling. Heed your own advice, think for your self (a trite term I usually dispise) and think analkytically and critically and seek ways that lead you to value the real communities around us, to see commonalities and worth in our neighbours and ways of thinking which don't pit us against the whole world. The "energy" in the form of mundane contacts and friendships from a few seemingly lowly and humdrum folk is far more powerful than that of all the gurus, mystics, self-proclaimed geniuses or wonder-rabbis in the world. Just my morning thoughts over coffee, for whatever that's worth.

Absolutely, you silly thing ! You see, once the Inspector has you labeled, he can put you in a box. Now, the box has dimensions within which you operate. Know these dimensions, and the Inspector has you captive, if you will. He can control you, even manipulate you. What we definitely can’t have is you running around this site naked, so to speak. Why, you might be getting up to anything and we wouldn’t know…

By the way, congratulations on I am very content, because I have found the Truth, the Life and the Way within me. I need nothing more. It's very simple, really.

An genuine case of “I am woman, I am strong”, what ! Being your own centre of creation must be, well, re-assuring ?

Anyway, boxing people is most important. Take Kinderling. The feisty bird has finally managed to wring out of him he’s a ‘born again Christian’ as if this site needed another example. Kinderling, himself confirms this by denying the Inspector is a Christian too. (…It’s the same old, same old from this type you know…). in a very lucid post at 00:13 ( …now he’s stopped covering his posts with sticky esoteric syrup…). He even gives us the reason why he has become an extremist for Christ. From the law of physics, “Every action has an opposite and equal reaction”. A difficult childhood has now given the world a difficult Christian - yes, we, the undeserving, no less !

Now, see Inspector, that boxing and labeling business may be the key to a high proportion of flat dinner dates a bachelor may encounter. Ladies generally prefer to be mysterious and unknowable, sublime mysteries to be glimpsed in parts, but never known or understood in full; to keep the blokes guessing, marvelling and preferably grovelling. Imply for a moment that you know the box dimensions and they'll object and worse, they'll think you a liar on te grounds since they haven't the foggiest about who they are, no one ever can. Fortunately, not all are like that. If you ever chance upon a lady who can actually laugh about this topic, hang on to her like a rat to a meat truck.

For fear of being thought sexist ...a vice I'm certain you hate more than any other... please note that I believe that middle-income urban males have in the last several decades defined their personas as ineffable mysteries as well. Alas, no one cares. Now with regards to me, I'm sure you don't even have to look up my box dimensions. H = bloody-minded Zionism; W = jollity and trucking; L = single malt and shmaltz herring. You can put a label and a seal on that.

Avi. Your wisdom appreciated as always. When it comes to understanding women, the Inspector employs the same procedure he uses for understanding any difficult entity. To wit, he lies on his back and looks up at it, with it’s legs slightly apart, to get the full picture. After all this, he still can’t understand why he remains a bachelor...

You'll have to sort out your differences with the Inspector, me I'm amused by Reuben-"Ray" Masters-"Obemeister" character's funny mishmash of pseudo-Freudian psych where general civilizational neurosis is converted to insanity and by the pseudo-history, as in the imagined bit about Jesus and his amazement at Gentiles. While I may not be familiar with the Gospels, I'm not aware of many amicable encounters with such, seeing that most Gentiles Jesus and his Jerusalemite contemporaries would have encountered were soldiers of an occupying power. Is Reuben channelling new Gospel accounts now?

That is puzzling indeed, Inspector, one would think your posture would generate animated discussion leading to yet another dinner on your account or that it would at least break the ice. Hmm, I wonder, do you remember to put the cap back on the scotch bottle as you adopt the position supine?

As Jesus was not a Christian, I know Christians need to be born again to get their heads out their Denominational Cult.

For your knowledge Avi, a gospel stated that Jesus had never seen the in Israel the faith of a centurian in taking Jesus' command to a sick person. You see, the white coat affect, can be passed on by faith. Magic? Miracle? No. All the bum jobs don't get recorded. That's why there are no Faith Healers in Hospitals running clinics.You still like your needle and thread.

Is this what Jesus actually had in mind when he spoke to a member of the Sanhedrin, that man is first born of water and then of spirit?

A Jew simply has to be born physically via her mother's broken-water and suck their identity from her.

However, spirit is born of spirit. A completely separate matter from creed and religion. The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.

And do you not understand these things?

Light has come into the world, but people loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed. But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what they have done has been done in the sight of God.

OiGYou must appreciate the ‘born again’ line was designed for pagans and Jews to adopt Christianity.

I certainly do not appreciate it. And your lewdness towards women must stop.

Inspector, sank like a brick? Not at all; one of your better ones. I had quite a chuckle actually, which is why I joined in the jollity.

Kinderling, I lost your previously clear reception, a refreshing and welcome outbreak of lucidity. Now you're speaking to me in parables and tongues again. Plain-talk for simple truckers like me is what's required. I'm not about to start researching the Gospels and will certainly not burn more than the twenty minutes I had to on googling "Roy Masters" to divine your meaning; I'm behind my sudies in my own faith as is.

Come now, Dodo, you can't mean that. Kinderling is not your average evangelical Christian, what with his reliance on Roy Masters and preference for speaking in riddles, and len is certainly nothing like him in content or style. While I may not understand the intricacies of the issues you two battle about, I can at least tell that len speaks coherently enough for you and others to understand what he means and to counter with arguments. Furthermore, while len and I are much, much farther apart theologically than he and you, the few exchanges I've had with him had have always been respectful. I wish you two could interact similarly.

OiG, the crusty "armchair St. Paulian" type "Christian," and Avi, the "born-again" Jew. You both need to label and box people, because you need to label and box yourselves. That's what the world is into nowadays, anyway ... Identity. How many tick boxes can we check off ... Race, Ethnicity, Nationality, Gender, Sexual Preference, Religion, Disability, Political Affiliation .... You need to identify with something greater than yourselves, and you fear to think and live "outside of the box," so to speak. It's easier to deal with someone who "identifies," or someone you can slap an identity on, someone who is stagnant, than it is to deal with a real live conscious human being who deeply thinks about the things that you prefer just to be spoon-fed by your "betters" because you have no faith in yourselves, and let the "experts" and "sexperts" take care of the business of your "soul" and your "morality" and the glorious afterlife.

I think you're really scared. And I think Kinderling scares you, not because he is "bonkers," as you like to make fun of him, but because he really does see you.

You've obviously thought about this quite a bit, Ms Olive. And after a needlessly long deluge of words on the evils of boxes and the merits of the do-it-yourself approach to everything, you obliviously proceeded to stuff the good Inspector and my own "born-again Jew" arse into boxes of your own making. O, the delicious irony.

If I may opine, nothing you've said here or elsewhere shows anything that I haven't heard elsewhere, especially at the college pubs, typically by the obligatory navel-gazing fem fatale bores in the group. Not revealing (or being cognisant of) your sources doesn't make you an outside-of-the-box type. I have no other way of putting it, but you don't seem very original to me. Many on this site, most of whom see themselves as ordinary types actually are original, outrageously so, but not you. Perhaps you should blame your busy parents or sue your nitwitty teachers all of whom lied to you about being special. And you didn't smell a rat when they told you that "everyone is special"?

Well, Kinderling, you got me there. You've taken me out of my zone...or my "box," as Ms Olive would have it. I've no idea why or even if "Christians do not know the sacred and profound when it is presented to them," and I don't muck around other people's scriptures if I can help it.

I can only remark that your way of transmitting information doesn't work for me and, as I can see, for most. I'm puzzled, because in several posts you showed that you can write well and that you're quite smart, certainly not "bonkers." Why you prefer

Mr. Avi, you stuff your own self in a box. You are the ones who identify yourselves as the "Christian" and the "Jew."

I never said I was different than anyone else or special. Don't put words in my mouth. I'm just like you. Except you take your spiritual identity from outside of yourself. You try to make yourself "special" by calling yourself a Jew. You would go to Jerusalem and smash your thick head against a wall like thousands and thousands before you because some Uber-rabbi advised you to, and believe the ludicrous because your holy book says so.

And I wouldn't blame parents or teachers for my own "sin" of not being original. I take the responsibility for it. I don't let Jesus die in my stead and ride his coattails into the promised land of complete forgiveness and bliss or feel I am a "Chosen One."

Avi, Do scriptures belong to certain people? Do you really think that when they call you goyem, unsaved and kuffar and legitimize deceit, taxing and distain towards you? Those who call you untouchable, that you should not then seek to understand their interpretations?

On the matter of clarity, I can teach you to put up a bookshelf. But I can't teach you to be inspired to create it for yourself.

As I dip into left-brain and right-brain thought, it may seem incomprehensible, as for those who make Heaven a Place as concrete as Earth, but it may dawn on them that a woman's body is not for their pleasure or their riddicule, that some parallel website has a Station of the Matron guffawing over the partially exposed loins of a male and enjoined by exclaimation "Good Ghia, she sounds just like Glen!"

On religious matters you need a dual core processor.

Splitting the atom releases energy, likewise the cutting edge of truth about yourself releases the soul.

Golly, Ms Ollie, for fear of sounding like you, I must remark that you certainly know sweet babkes about me, Jews or humans in general. No matter. All adults think for themselves, by the way, or if you re-frame the rules and the terms like you and Kinderling are trying to do, no one does, except perhaps for a few feral children and feces-covered unfortunates raised in some pervert's basement. Forgive me from lumping you and Kinderling together in this rant, but while you two may be fascinating, mysterious and inimitable individuals and all that shite, for the purpose of this discussion, you two can be conveniently and economically squished into the same box and no one will know the difference.

Not very "outside-the-box," this sport of trying to de-Jew the Jew, either. Gets played in every generation, all over the world and in a myriad of different ways. Those who presume to teach us, our "saviours from our selves," repeat the same arguments in the same breathless ways since Babylon, always thinking themselves brilliant and original. Zzzzzzzzz. But more often then not they become a little more strident over time soon enough they are at our doors with the torches and pitchforks, ready to burn our books or our bodies and to "save" or "liberate" our children. Same-ld, same-old.

To wit: Having grown up under two communist governments in primary state schools, I'm actually very familiar with the almost identical "original" thoughts about religion, Christians and Jews. It was part of our daily "consciousness raising" ritual. Unfortunately, we couldn't laugh or stick out our middle finger at the nitwits for fear of having our lives turned into an even bigger Hell. Yet, a few Christians and Jews still managed to keep what you, Kinderling and Guru Reuben and call our "external" identities, our boxes, unevenly split brains or whatever current nonsense terms you have. And all just so that I can go to the Kotel and bang my thick skull on top of my proverbial stiff neck against a nice limestone block of my own choosing. Folks don't usually bang their heads against the Wall, but perhaps I will this year, just to remind myself that even among the millenia-old rubble, the stalkers are still there, but we're still around and right in your insipid, smiley faces with all the things you uebermenschen dislike us for. So, if I go on with an impromptu prayer from "inside myself," I will bless the Almighty for allowingh me to live in a time and a place where me and mine don't have to worry about or even listen to such brilliant, thankfully powerless folks like you,Kinderling and the Roy Masters. At least for now. Am yisroel chai!

"Me and mine" is a standard phrase for to referring to one's family and or other social groupings. As for "rules," in the context of what I wrote, these would be the rules of logic we assign in order to be able to communicate with one another. In this case, the sophomoric "thinking for yourself" meme nonsense which is never defined either in psychological or sociological terms and usually means, "think my way."

Kinderling, dear chap, you are at liberty to reorganize your brain and redefine standard ways of communicating, to pretend to misunderstand, to change your rules of logic and even the English language itself. You can also quote or come up with little wisdoms like, you got out of the fire and now cling to a tree to yor merry heart's content. The thing is, though, in our free, fast-paced, information-rich environment no one is compelled to study anyone's idiosyncracies, to play along or take them seriously. I know, it's rough and maybe even unfair, but you're stuck with competing in the "market place of ideas," which explains the corelation of the appearance of the Internet with the decline of the intellectually sloppy, 1970s style of cult philosophies.

Avi. Outstanding post at 09:32 you magnificent wordsmith. One can picture Olive cursing under her breath as she takes off the dungarees she dons specially whenever posting here. (Inspector hums Chaka Khan’s “I’m every woman” – seems rather appropriate, don’t you think ? ). Incidentally, have you noticed the number of times cock sure women who know it all fall for the wrong man ? Own worst enemy and all that, you know.

Anyway, everyone is back in their box now, and God is in his heaven. Well, everyone’s back except Kinderling who has tested born again positive, a life long condition which not only makes life uncomfortable for the sufferer, but for any proper Christian around him within pointing distance. He wants to revert to posting mystic gobbledygook as a clever stratagem, a dreadful idea because he’s really piss poor at it….

There is a saying for bad religious leaders, 'do what they say, and not what they do.' For they exhort you to strive to learn to be good, so they can hide what they're doing. They got the suits, while you dance to flutes.

There should be an exactly equal saying for good religious leaders too: 'do what they say, but not what they do' because someone is going to beautify them into a God or a Saint and you'll forget and leave their teaching behind, to baske only in the Portrait of their Glory under the guide of a priest.

The result is the same in these two observations, to simply live by their teachings; either they are true or they are not. You can test them and reveal in them any falsehood or sanity just by practice.

If you love your God, and love your Anti-God neighbor as yourself, excellent. You realize you know nothing.

However, tell me you are blessed by a birthright and I'll show you a big fat birthwrong competing for validation.

Inspector, few seem to be around this forgotten post, so I'll tell you a secret: My wordsmithing here, on which you generously complimented me, owes quite a bit to my intense study of His Grace's and....your styles. His Grace is of course more formal and his grammar is frightfully impeccable. There is a peculiar rhythm to it, a cadence, and a cutting precision. You, on the other hand, seem to know exactly how much pressure to exert to break under someone's skin without killing him and you do outrageous and unpredictable stuff with the English language much of which sends my gasping for air or howling with mirth. I'm surprised you haven't noticed what a shameless imitator I am, expecting you to jump up at any moment on your hind legs, point a shaky finger in my direction and bellow out, "You, Sir, are a thief!" Better to fess up now than be sorry later, I reason.

Kinderling, the way you hop from topic to topic is leading me to the suspicion that you're on this site to get free editorial feedback for a book you're plotting. I can give you grades or brief comments if you wish, but for more detailed assistance I have to bill. You get an 8.5 on the bad leader/good leader bit, mostly because I've never heard that one (I like surprises), but a 3 on the G-d/anti-G-d bit because without a realistic context, it makes little sense. I hope I'm critiquing you, not Roy, because Roy's got plenty of dough to pay for such a service.

We (that is the Bedioun Brady bunch), haven't forgotten this thread. To do a Carl Jacobs, Inspector held off the enemy, until the seventh cav arrived, that is you and poor old dodo.

I watched the film" 7th Cavalry" today- my uncle is recovering from his Prostate operation- hence lack of posting recently, as we are all fussing over him; the other film we watched was "Went the Day Well?"

We also watched the Canadian set 'Ice road truckers' the other day and thought of you; especially when the trucker was the first to test one of the 'ice roads'.

We thought it was you, but as the gent got half way through the lake he did the 'sign of the cross', so realised it wasn't you, but inspector instead (:

olive, few seem to be around to undrstand these posts, so I'll tell you a secret.

“The true value of man is not determined by his possession, supposed or real, of Truth, but rather by his sincere exertion to get to the Truth. It is not possession of Truth by which he extends his powers and in which his ever-growing perfectability is to be found. Possession makes one passive, indolent and proud. If God were to hold all Truth concealed in his right hand, and in his left only the steady and diligent drive for Truth, albeit with the proviso that I would always and forever err in the process, and to offer me the choice, I would with all humility take the left hand. ”

Perhaps the following wisdom of Solomon might help you when replying to Kinders and Olive :

"Do not answer a fool according to his folly, or you will be like him yourself. Answer a fool according to his folly, or he will be wise in his own eyes. Like cutting off one's feet or drinking violence is the sending of a message by the hand of a fool. Like a lame man's legs that hang limp is a proverb in the mouth of a fool. Like tying a stone in a sling is the giving of honor to a fool. Like a thornbush in a drunkard's hand is a proverb in the mouth of a fool. Like an archer who wounds at random is he who hires a fool or any passer-by. As a dog returns to its vomit, so a fool repeats his folly."

The prostitute mother of the child said, “Please, my lord, give her the living baby! Don’t kill him!”

So the baby would have gone straight to the thief if all she had replied was "oh thank you, thank you, I've got my baby, I knew you'd give her back to me". And the simpleton King would have chopped off the head from the shoulders of the real mother.

However, the thief then said “Neither I nor you shall have him. Cut him in two!”

It then didn't take a genius,or even a half-brained Believer reading the Holy Scripture to then figure who the real mother was. Duh?

It was a such a close call that it could have been, "the parable of the moron who could not discern".

I've got you and OiG as armchair-pundits watching a soccer match where legally they are entilted to have no women-players and no women-referees, sheer escapism, and then Olive comes along as a reporter and bloody ruins everything about your Beautiful Game.

OiG, I never curse under my breath. Not over comments on a blog, anyway.

I will leave you and your Old Testament buddy to chucke and pat each other on the back over your oh-so-articulate wordsmithing which rivals the liberal intellegentsia and fling empty "tally ho's" and "jolly goods" at each other. Have fun, guys!

A refuah shlema רפואה שלמה to Lord Cavendon, Hannah. Pass on my get-well wishes to him from me please and don't baby him or spoil him with movies too much, as we'll never be able to get him to resume his duties and take up is post here.

For me it's ben one of those days where even thinking about trucking hurts. Oh, look! I see Kinderoo and Olive Oyl are having a jolly good time in the full moon. Cute. We should set up a play date for them. On that lovely note, tally-ho!

If you understand Jesus spoke of heaven and hell as a state of mind and not a place corpses go and live, then to call someone an idiot and believe you are superior sets you up to be open to the belief that you can be called stupid by someone superior to you. That is the hell you have cast yourself into.

"Imagine there's no Heaven... No Hell below us, above us only sky" And John Lennon killed by Mark Chapman who believed in The External Voice of God.

The Delluded are a walking timebomb, for when their pets of affection start having a mind of their own, they go into a rage, for they testify that they can, and should, get up and think for themselves, and see the years wasted.

Good Lord Avi, ! It’s becoming a bit of a confessional in here. Lets join in...

One has long realised that to hold a fellows attention in the literary, a style of which he would not immediately be familiar with is absolutely mandatory you know. It’s leads him to the end of your discourse, sometimes out of curiosity than interest, and if all goes well, leaves him waiting for your next offering. No man should ever be so proud as to expect a fellow to read what he has posted, simply because he has. It’s a rather humble approach in actuality, don’t you agree ?

The Inspector is so honoured that you, or anyone else for that matter, thinks so highly of the construct that they are willing to absorb it. The printed word is such a powerful instrument, we should hold it in reverence and adorn it whenever. Rather like a beautifully attired Roman Catholic church, no less.

Ones style is all from the past, of course. Edwardian with a touch of the Victorian about it. From a time when a chap out posted in the Empire had the time and inclination to write long flowery letters home to his nearest and dearest of an evening. Often, save the odd game of billiards or whist, it would have been one of the most interesting past times open to him. Damn well looked forward to it, so he did ! Ah, for a simpler time as then…

Blast the time, must go. Has fallen on this fellow to organise the Dawn Patrol tomorrow. Must rise early and all that.

Meanwhile, carry on that man !

Hannah, ones felicitations to your uncle. Let’s hope the MO sees fit to release him at the earliest.

Kinderling, keep on posting your presumptuous whatever, old man. It’s er, well, there you go. But you must admit you’ll have to go a long way to beat “First there is a mountain, then there is no mountain, then there is”.

Olive. Don’t let those beastly men upset you like that, dear. You are just as good as they are, probably…

Jesus called his brothers and sisters those who understood. The filial love that identifies you is not real. If the earth was going to be destroyed but by some reasoning some bacteria could be sent to a habital planet, we would rejoyce. We are connected more by our conscious than just mere flesh.

So OiG is right, "First there is a mountain", like we call finned creatures fish,'Then there is no mountain' because biologists discovered fish are less related to each other and more to land animals'And now you can see the real mountain for what it is'I hope that is what OiG meant.

So the scientists prepared a petri dish to send the microbes to their new home and Jewish contingent said "we command you to send Jewish microbes of a mother's DNA". Islam wanted a father's knowing the bride would convert. The Roman Catholics wanted the Pope's, the Protestants from someone Born Again... And the scientists looked up."This Ark is travelling 7 Light Years, hit by near 0 Kelvin, showered by Cosmic Radiation and goodness knows what; and you want extremophobes, when we want extremophiles. You'll have to wait three billion years again to sort it all out once and for all"

A gathering of Feminists, men who had apologized for Ghengis Khan and for all the oppressions males had done in the past, and the LGBT and ManBoy Association. They demanded the Gay Gene be placed in the dish. About 10%.The scientists looked up. "There isn't a Gay Gene," and continued their work.

Suddenly a loud blare of trumpets sounded and thousands of Hindus, Buddhists and Jains turned up. "Oh, no what now?" the space mission reverberated."We demand...""You demand?....""We demand you send a Lotus Flower with your microbes.""What? Why?""Because we want to welcome the new planet, to show our hospitality, that we come in peace""But you demand... what will you do if we don't?""Evacuate the building and burn it down""Then we will lose any hope of Earth's Life ever existing again!""Do you not know if one side of the universe dies the other side is reborn?"Just then the Socialists driving the Communists behind them, arrived with an army of SWAT Teams and Tanks."Sorry, we're going to close you down. There's no more Funding for this Space Operation. All money is been channeled to pay for the MASSIVE END OF THE WORLD party, with free food and drink and spectacular firework displays for everyone".

You remind the Inspector of the schoolboy who won a spelling competition. He is presented to the mayor, who will give him his prize. “Congratulations son” says the mayor. The boy immediately starts spelling out “c o n g r a t u l a t i o n s s o n”.

In other words, there is a time when you don’t have to look deeply into what you read. Like 99% of the time...

About His Grace:

Archbishop Cranmer takes as his inspiration the words of Sir Humphrey Appleby: ‘It’s interesting,’ he observes, ‘that nowadays politicians want to talk about moral issues, and bishops want to talk politics.’ It is the fusion of the two in public life, and the necessity for a wider understanding of their complex symbiosis, which leads His Grace to write on these very sensitive issues.

Cranmer's Law:

"It hath been found by experience that no matter how decent, intelligent or thoughtful the reasoning of a conservative may be, as an argument with a liberal is advanced, the probability of being accused of ‘bigotry’, ‘hatred’ or ‘intolerance’ approaches 1 (100%).”

Follow His Grace on

The cost of His Grace's conviction:

His Grace's bottom line:

Freedom of speech must be tolerated, and everyone living in the United Kingdom must accept that they may be insulted about their own beliefs, or indeed be offended, and that is something which they must simply endure, not least because some suffer fates far worse. Comments on articles are therefore unmoderated, but do not necessarily reflect the views of Cranmer. Comments that are off-topic, gratuitously offensive, libelous, or otherwise irritating, may be summarily deleted. However, the fact that particular comments remain on any thread does not constitute their endorsement by Cranmer; it may simply be that he considers them to be intelligent and erudite contributions to religio-political discourse...or not.

The Anglican Communion has no peculiar thought, practice, creed or confession of its own. It has only the Catholic Faith of the ancient Catholic Church, as preserved in the Catholic Creeds and maintained in the Catholic and Apostolic constitution of Christ's Church from the beginning.Dr Geoffrey Fisher, Archbishop of Canterbury, 1945-1961

British Conservatism's greatest:

The epithet of 'great' can be applied only to those who were defining leaders who successfully articulated and embodied the Conservatism of their age. They combined in their personal styles, priorities and policies, as Edmund Burke would say, 'a disposition to preserve' with an 'ability to improve'.

I am in politics because of the conflict between good and evil, and I believe that in the end good will triumph.Margaret Thatcher, Baroness Thatcher LG, OM, PC, FRS.(Prime Minister 1979-1990)

We have not overthrown the divine right of kings to fall down for the divine right of experts.Harold Macmillan, 1st Earl of Stockton, OM, PC.(Prime Minister 1957-1963)

Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery.Sir Winston Churchill, KG, OM, CH, TD, FRS, PC (Can).(Prime Minister 1940-1945, 1951-1955)

I am not struck so much by the diversity of testimony as by the many-sidedness of truth.Stanley Baldwin, 1st Earl Baldwin of Bewdley, KG, PC.(Prime Minister 1923-1924, 1924-1929, 1935-1937)

If you believe the doctors, nothing is wholesome; if you believe the theologians, nothing is innocent; if you believe the military, nothing is safe.Robert Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury, KG, GCVO, PC.(Prime Minister 1885-1886, 1886-1892, 1895-1902)

I am a Conservative to preserve all that is good in our constitution, a Radical to remove all that is bad. I seek to preserve property and to respect order, and I equally decry the appeal to the passions of the many or the prejudices of the few.Benjamin Disraeli KG, PC, FRS, Earl of Beaconsfield.(Prime Minister 1868, 1874-1880)

Public opinion is a compound of folly, weakness, prejudice, wrong feeling, right feeling, obstinacy, and newspaper paragraphs.Sir Robert Peel, Bt.(Prime Minister 1834-1835, 1841-1846)

I consider the right of election as a public trust, granted not for the benefit of the individual, but for the public good.Robert Jenkinson, 2nd Earl of Liverpool.(Prime Minister 1812-1827)

Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves.The Rt Hon. William Pitt, the Younger.(Prime Minister 1783-1801, 1804-1806)